Two years on from the Guardian's first story on the extent of phone hacking, the full truth of what was going on at the News of the World is being stripped bare. Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP

•The Q&A is now closed. Thanks to all who took part. We've collected Alan's answers to your questions at the bottom of this article

Sometimes the forward momentum of newspaper investigations is virtually invisible to the naked eye. It's lucky that Nick Davies is an exceptionally patient reporter because there must have been times during the past two years when he felt no one wanted to hear what he was so clearly saying.

Nick's first story on the full extent of the phone-hacking scandal was published almost exactly two years ago – on 8 July 2009. It was – or should have been – explosive. It reported that a major global media company – News International – had paid out £1m secretly to settle legal cases which revealed criminality within their business.

Instead of going back to parliament or the regulator to admit that they had been misled, the company's chairman, James Murdoch, signed a large cheque to stop the truth coming out.

With any non-media company this revelation would have led to blanket coverage, calls for resignations, immediate action by the regulator etc. Instead there was a kind of ghostly silence.

News International, doubtless pleased by this clean bill of health, came out all guns blazing, denouncing the Guardian's deliberate attempts to mislead the public. Most of the press decided it wasn't much of a story. The regulator decided there was nothing wrong. And many MPs were sympathetic in private, but indicated there was little in it for them in sticking their heads above any public parapet.

And so we settled in for the long haul. Week by week, story by story, column by column, doorstep by doorstep, Nick Davies prised open the truth. There were some other heroes: a handful of lawyers and MPs and a few journalists – on the New York Times, Independent, FT, BBC and Channel 4. But it was pretty lonely work for those at the heart of it. And there were plenty of people yawning from the sidelines, claiming it was all a bit obsessive.

But investigative journalism is a bit obsessive. Sometimes it works by small, incremental, barely perceptible steps.

Scroll forward two years and the full truth of what was going on at the News of the World is dramatically being stripped bare. Some kind of mental dam has been broken. MPs, journalists, regulators and police are speaking confidently again as they should. The palpably intimidating spectre of an apparently untouchable media player has been burst.

But what now? How can we make sure that we never again have this kind of dominant force in British public life?

One positive step yesterday was the announcement that there would be at least one public inquiry into what on earth was going on within the Metropolitan police.

There are two outstanding issues that will affect the future of the media in this country. One is the threatened imminent decision to wave through the deal which would give Rupert Murdoch total control over the biggest commercial broadcaster as well as 40% of the national press.

Anyone who reads into the story of the last two years can see that's a terrible idea. But – on the narrow grounds on which Jeremy Hunt and David Cameron are fighting – it's a complex issue mixing competition law, Ofcom, plurality and politics.

And then there's the question of how the press should be regulated. There will be plenty of calls for statutory regulation in the days and weeks to come.

I don't like the idea. I resist the notion of state licensing of journalists – and I struggle to see how there is any easy definition of "journalist" in 2011. So I would like to see self-regulation continue.

But I admit this is shaky ground. When the PCC came out with its laughable report into phone hacking in November 2009 (which, to its credit, it finally retracted yesterday) I warned that this was going to be dangerous for the cause of self regulation and I quit the PCC's code committee in protest.

The PCC's weakness is that it doesn't have the powers of a regulator. So it should either abandon the claim to be a regulator – and carry on doing its valuable work of mediation and adjudication – or else it has to acquire powers of compelling witnesses, calling evidence etc. But how does it do that without becoming laboriously legalistic and horrendously expensive to run?

These are some of the issues now coming down the slipway and I look forward to discussing them.

Comments will be off on this article until 2.30pm on Thursday when Alan Rusbridger will be answering questions live online for two hours.

Bochi asks:

Oborne goes on to allege you also warned Nick Clegg about Coulson's activities.

Is this true? If so, what were Cameron and Clegg told that is now in the public domain? What have they known all along?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Peter Oborne is right. Before the election it was common knowledge in Fleet Street that an investigator used by the NoW during Andy Coulson's editorship was on remand for conspiracy to murder. We couldn't report that due to contempt of court restrictions, but I thought it right that Cameron should know before he took any decisions about taking Andy Coulson into Number 10. So I sent word via an intermediary close to Cameron. And I also told Clegg personally.

shanecroucher asks:

Does the Guardian have any evidence of phone hacking happening at other British newspapers ? If so, once the dust settles over NotW, will the Guardian widen its continuing investigation to these papers too?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I think the bulk of Nick Davies's evidence relates to the NotW. He did write a more general chapter on the so-called dark arts of Fleet Street in his book, Flat Earth News.

To be frank, it's taken him all this time to land this one, so he's hardly had time to look elsewhere so far

nega9000 asks:

The past few days have had me genuinely wondering about what, if any, licensing requirements there are on running a newspaper.

If a broadcaster had been up to what the NoW were doing it would quite rightly have been pulled off the air. So what exactly does a newspaper have to do to lose its right to publish in the UK?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I'm anxious about the notion of state licensing for the press. We got rid of that more than 150 years ago (date, someone?) and I wouldn't want to see it back. In an age when anyone can call thsemselves a journalist I see difficulties of definition. Would Huffington Post have to get a licence? So, I think it's probably unworkable as well as undesirable. But I'd be interested to hear other views.

digit asks:

Do you agree with Oborne that this renders Cameron's position questionable?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

No - but I do think it showed lousy judgement. I don't think I was the only person to warn Cameron in advance about Coulson, incidentally.

passthebucket asks:

Many congratulations on your determined coverage of this story. Also, do you ever fear retribution from Mr Murdoch, as many people apparently do?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Thank you. But Nick Davies is the hero of the hour. I honestly don't think Murdoch would win much public sympathy if he started going after the people who have been criticising him or the NoW this week.

miket10000 asks:

Media regulation. I don't like the idea of state regulation either, but we've seen that self-regulation in its current form just doesn't work. Do you see a future role for, e.g. Ofcom in providing or overseeing independent press regulation?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I agree that this hasn't been a wonderful advertisement for self-regulation. The short answer is that, no, the PCC can't go on as it is. Its credibility is hanging by a thread.

We did say this back in November 2009 when the PCC came out with its laughable report into phone-hacking. We said in an editorial that this was a dangerous day for press regulation - and so it's turned out.

The PCC has this week withdrawn that report and has a team looking at the issues and at the mistakes it's made in the past.

I don't know how Ofcom could do the job without falling into the category of statutory regulation. Does anyone else?

THEJohnDog asks:

It suggests to me that, despite the strong words in the Commons yesterday, most politicians and media outlets are still frightened of hitting Rupert where it hurts. What do you think?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

All credit to Ed Miliband, who was pretty forthright I thought. And I don't think anyone could say that Tom Watson, Paul Farrelly, Chris Bryant, Nicholas Soames or Simon Hughes pulled their punches (I didn't see all of the debate). I don't think that would have happened two years ago. And, this week, the Telegraph, Mail, Independent and FT have all been full-throated. Even the Times has written a leader being critical of its sister paper. So I do see a sea-change.

DavidBanks asks:

Do you worry that the consequence of all this, after the inquiries, and any possible prosecutions, will be legislation that, might hinder legitimate journalism?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Well, I really hope not. That's been my fear all along: that, by being so feeble back in 2009, the PCC was inviting politicians to go for something more restrictive. So - for the sake of all reporters engaged in legitimate journalism - it's really important that we find a way of re-making the PCC into something that has credibility.

What do you think, David?

Alan Rusbridger adds:

General question on what rules we have at the Guardian.

We don't pay for stories. Reporters are told not to use private investigators without my permission. A very rare example: I agreed to use someone outside the paper, and that was over evidence of corrupt dealings by a global corporation. The Guardian did not feature on the list of newspapers exposed by the Information Commissioner in 2006.

Generally, I think the greater the possible intrusion by journalists the higher the public interest hurdle has to be.

I like the guidelines suggested by former spook Sr David Omand for his trade. I think they're good questions for any news organisation.

• There must be sufficient cause – the intrusion needs to be justified by the scale of potential harm, which might be result from it.

• There must be integrity of motive - the intrusion must be justified in terms of the public good which would follow from publication.

• The methods used must be in proportion to the seriousness of story and its public interest, using the minimum possible intrusion.

• There must be proper authority – any intrusion must be authorised at a sufficiently senior level and with appropriate oversight.

• There must be a reasonable prospect of success: fishing expeditions are not justified.

I did, incidentally, suggest that the PCC might incorporate those guidelines into the PCC's editorial codebook, but got a polite rejection.

Fwoggie asks:

Celebrities and sports stars have long complained about a lack of privacy in this country - with some formula 1 drivers emigrating purely to get peace and quiet elsewhere. Do we need new privacy laws to match the much stronger ones found in many parts of Europe? In your opinion what form should they take?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I think the law is developing at its own pace and doesn't need accelerating. I have the same anxieties as everyone about secret justice and superinjunctions etc. Sometimes, when you read the full text of the recent privacy injunctions, the cases are more finely balanced and complicated than you might guess from some of the reporting.

Henry Porter asks:

The failure of New International to apologise in any meaningful way, the continued presence of Rebekah Brooks at the helm of the British subsidiary of News Corp, and Rupert Murdoch's determination to tough this one out, as though he was still battling the print unions at Wapping, all suggest that the company is out of step with the change of attitude that has occurred this week. But more profoundly, it speaks of company that has very little attachment or care for the society in which it has flourished. Is there some basic contempt for British society in the character of News International that stems from Rupert Murdoch's personal disdain?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I don't think I'd go this far. But there is, to my mind, a real problem with the size and dominance of the company - and I'd agree that the senior management this week has revealed itself to be profoundly out of step with the changed public mood.

Treasurebum asks:

How important has your special correspondent Nick Davies been in the development of this story?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

None of this would have happened without Nick Davies. I know he's not going to win a popularity contest in Wapping at the moment - but I think the vast majority of journalists in this country respect what he's done. And I think that British journalism will owe him a big debt in the future.

sabian asks:

What sort of public inquiry and reforms to the PCC do we need to reduce the risk of another collusive and conspiratorial scandal, drawing in 3 of the main pillars of our democracy, the media, police and Government?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

The PCC is a very good mediator and does a lot of valuable backroom work on privacy and on settling complaints. The trouble is that it sails under the flag of "regulator."

Real regulators (think lawyers, doctors, utility companies) have real powers. The PCC was quite unable to get to the truth of what was going on because it's not remotely equipped to do so. Essentially, in 2009, it wrote to the present NoW editor asking if everything was all right, and accepted Myler's assurances that they were (even though he wasn't around at the time). That's not regulation.

So the PCC should either get itself the powers to investigate (compel witness, call for evidence etc), or it should rebrand itself as a mediation and arbitration service.

undermywing asks:

As an editor yourself Alan do you believe that Ms Brooks can rightly be excused for taking part responsibility for the phone hacking? In other words do you believe her that she knew nothing or for that matter Murdoch himself?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I can't imagine how anyone edits a paper week after week printing sensational stories without asking to see the evidence. The only conceivable way that could work would be if an editor placed total reliance on the head of legal affairs - but NI's lawyer, Tom Crone, has told the House of Commons that he knew nothing about any of this. So it's all a bit of a mystery to me as to how it was all done.

atewashere asks:

Will you be offering Hugh Grant a job as a columnist? The man is a legend - did you hear him destroy that former NOW journo on 5 Live.

Alan Rusbridger replies:

We can't afford him, or we definitely would.

nineteeneightythree asks:

Thanks for hosting this Q&A session. One area I'd like to know more about is how Operations Weeting is being handled: despite the evident failings of the first enquiry, their current approach appears far from robust.

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I haven't had any contact with Weeting. My external impression is that they are doing a thorough job. A marked contrast with what went before at the Yard.

Msay asks:

Do you regret running the Kelvin MacKenzie article about how great Rupert Murdoch is now? Or was it part of a clever plan to lull him into a false sense of security?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Comment is free...

SpinningHugo asks:

Under what circumstances would you be prepared to return to serve on the PCC code committee?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Well, as I keep on repeating the mantra that I believe in effective self-regulation then I'm happy to play a part in making it work in future. It's a positive step that the PCC has this week withdrawn its ridiculous 2009 report (read it here to remind yourself how feeble it was).

PadraigR asks:

Hi AlanCongratulations on brilliant work...

We all seem to agree that self-regulation is still important, but I'm struggling at the moment to think of a new model. What do you think a new body would/should look like? And what powers do you imagine it having?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

The question it must ask itself is how it would investigate a scandal like this in future?

It's worth looking at the way the former independent television regulator, the ITC, reacted when, back in 1998, the Guardian published allegations about a programme on drug-running made by Carlton TV. The ITC imposed a £2m fine after a thorough investigation, led by Michael Beloff QC and the former controller of editorial policy at the BBC (the head of corporate affairs at Carlton at the time — one David Cameron.)

So such things are do-able. The problem is they're expensive. Maybe the offending news organisation should pay for the cost of the investigation? That seems fairer than increasing the industry levy for everyone. Why should the Stoke Sentinel or Cambridge Evening News pay much higher fees toward the PCC when the most serious offenders are (on recent form, anyway) the nationals?

Manningtreeimp asks:

Did you anticipate the outrage that has been seen over the last couple of days ?

And

Do you think Labour have now effectively burnt any remaining bridges they had with Murdoch...permanently....and if so do you (as I do) see this has one of the few good things to come out of this sorry affair ?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

I knew back in July 2009 that this was going to cause a stink. But I didn't suspect that it would end up with the sort of disclosures of really shameful behaviour we've seen this week.

Labour. Well, only if NI/Murdoch carry on as before. The smart thing for NI to do is to show that they no longer behave like the big bully on the block and that they can - with a bit of humility - accept many of the criticisms levelled against them.

Usap asks:

Which Guardian Newsgroup journalists used private investigator Steve Whittamore? Did they vet any of the information he gave them?Are internal investigations going ahead, especially within The Observer?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

See earlier response about Guardian journalists - ie none. The Observer did show up on the Whittamore list and John Mulholland, the present editor, has gone into them in as much detail as he can (some of the journalists using Whittamore have since left the paper), though none of it happened on his watch. As far as we know Whittamore did no phone-hacking.

Partake asks:

Do you see this case having an affect on the extent to which anonymous sources are used in Journalism?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Not sure there's a direct cause and effect here... but certainly think that, with digital, journalists should, and can, be much more open about their sources, linking wherever possible.

Hellzapoppin asks:

Alan,

Sorry to ask again and apologies if you were intending to answer it.

Whilst I know it's asking you to speculate, you've said you don't think hiring Coulson makes Cameron's position untenable, but what if say Coulson or Brookes end up with serious criminal charges against them(what is Coulson can be proved to have perjured himself) surely that could change everything?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Well, I think the error of judgement was back in May 2010 when Cameron took Coulson into Number 10. A public inquiry might want to go into what questions he asked at the time. To what extent was he vetted? Why did the vetting not throw any of this up when every journalist knew about it.

Did anyone read these links for instance from 2002? They showed a pattern of corrupt officers, private investigators and bribes among people Coulson hired while he was editor.

So there ought to be some searching questions about who looked into what and whether Cameron was remotely sceptical enough about Coulson's assurances when so much was on the public record.

DavidHolmes asks:

Hello Alan,

I am a member of staff in the Department of Journalism Studies at the University of Sheffield. Do you think this affair has implications for what we should be teaching young journalists? If so, what do you think they are?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Well I hope (and assume) you do a really thorough course in ethics. And I think all journalists should be taught to say 'no' to doing anything they consider unethical. The NUJ has a useful role to play in supporting any journalist who takes an ethical stand and is threatened as a result.

michaelamherst asks:

Do you buy the government's line that it can't take 'the fit and proper person' test into account in the BSkyB takeover for legal reasons? If Theresa May can amend the law to address the concerns about bail why can't the government do the same in these exceptional circumstances?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

No, I don't buy the line. But Ofcom has to wait to see what happens with the criminal inquiries. That's why Hunt has to pause - also to consider the tens of thusands of objections he's received.

digit asks:

Should Sun and NOTW accounts properly detail how much of their staff time has been devoted to trolling on this and other CiF threads?

Alan Rusbridger replies:

Sounds like one for Yates of the Yard

The final word:

Thanks everyone for comments. Really interesting thread. My apologies to all those I couldn't answer in time (still only use four fingers to type with). And thanks to everyone who has said nice things about the Guardian's role in all this.